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Let’s take a minute to understand the units that are relevant here. The nature of the Universe is such that we always measure its scales in extraordinary units: the radius of Earth’s orbit, the distance light travels in a year, the amount of mass found in a star. One such super-unit is the enormous energy radiated when one of the largest stars ends its life in a dramatic supernova explosion. Often, a supernova outshines the light of its entire galaxy. Because all supernovae come from stars whose masses vary only by about a factor of 10, the energy they generate is roughly equivalent, and can be referred to as a unit we call “one supernova”. At the time of the initial discovery of GRBs, supernovae were the most energetic events known in the Universe. Are GRBs more powerful then supernovae? The answer that came back from the BeppoSAX results was “yes!”. Given their immense distances, a typical GRB would pump out 100 to 1000 times the energy of a supernova into space.
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